winter song
by dulcets
Summary: December never felt so wrong. jade/beck cat/andre. warning: character death


**winter song**

**summary:** December never felt so wrong.

**disclaimer: **i do not own victorious

warning: character death

* * *

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This is how it starts:

Six friends are driving home from a karaoke club on a strangely cold (for LA) December night, three squeezed in the front seat of the car, three in the back. Melodious voices fill the air, hands are raised to the sky and bodies sway along to the beat coming from the radio. They're all having the time of their lives, and then they're not.

Beck takes his eyes off the road for a split second to turn around and mention something about "getting lucky tonight" to Andre, at the same time that Jade sees the upcoming truck.

"Watch out!" she screams, too late, and the truck collides with the right side of their car.

She hears screams, doesn't know if they're hers or someone else's, doesn't care too much honestly, feels a sharp pain in her head, and finally blacks out.

.

When Jade wakes up, the first thing she notices is the pain, throbbing and pulsing, in her head.

The second thing she notices is that she's strapped in a bed in an ambulance, along with Tori and Robbie.

The last thing she notices is that they're both dead.

She passes out again.

.

When Jade awakes for the second time, she's lying on her side, still in a bed, but in a hospital rather than an ambulance. She's hooked up to a beeping machine, and there's an IV attached to her.

She wants to close her eyes, go back to sleep again, maybe never wake up. All in all, she just wants to forget.

But her throat is dry and her head is killing her, so she wills herself to turn over on her back and face the three people she has no doubt are in the room.

"Well, looks who's finally awake," Beck says, smiling at her, and she thinks it might be the first time she wasn't happy to see him. Even if there weren't faint tear tracks running down his face, she'd be able to tell his smile was fake. She can read him like a book.

Andre and Cat are there too, but they're both asleep on the tiny couch in the corner.

"Thirsty," she tries to say, but a horrible croaking sound comes out instead. Luckily, after putting her hand on her throat, Beck gets the hint and goes to fetch her some water.

When Beck returns and Jade has furiously gulped down her water, she manages to build up the courage to ask the questions she knows she already has the answers to.

"Tori and Robbie," she starts, eyes focused intently on her hospital gown, "are they-"

"Yes," Beck spits out before she can even finish speaking. "They're gone."

Jade thinks that this moment, not the wreck, not the ambulance, but the confirmation of it all, is when everything changes.

.

Everyone, Jade discovers a few days after getting out of the hospital, handles grief differently.

Beck won't drive. He won't even touch a steering wheel or keys. Andre has to force him into his car.

Cat cries a lot. Jade comes over to her house one day and all the little red head does her entire visit is sit on her bed, hug her stuffed animals, and sob. Jade wonders if the tears have even stopped falling at all since the crash.

Andre copes like he does with everything: using music. He plays sad melodies on his piano, slow and filled with lots of low notes, and sometimes she catches him quietly humming "Make It Shine", or "Tell Me That You Love Me".

Jade though, Jade still just tries to forget. She likes to think that she wasn't even very close to either of them, but all of a sudden she is seeing them both everywhere. She sees Robbie in the dolls of the window of an antique stores, sees him in one of her favorite Stephen King books, has a flashback of him reading one once, forever ago. She sees Tori in sheet music, sees her in the pop stars on TV, even sees her in the stars sometimes.

Somehow, the sadness cause Andre and Cat to kind of fall together.

He goes to her house and sits on her bed with her. He holds her hand and lets her cry into his shoulder. She sits by him on the piano bench and tells him she likes his pretty music, even if it makes her sad.

Beck and Jade fall apart.

It's not that they fight, but rather that they _don't fight_. They don't kiss either, don't do much of anything really. Sometimes she catches him just staring out the window, knows he's thinking about _her._ She knows that he loved Tori, once maybe, and regardless of the fact that he's been with Jade with over 4 years, those feelings don't just go away, no matter how small they were.

She's not sure if she still loves him, not sure if he still loves her either, but still, they lay curled together deep into the night and both try to focus on breathing together.

.

Jade leaves one day. She tries not to look back.

She goes to New York, thinking the big city, the lights, the noise, the people, will all distract her. She meets lots of people, but the ones that stick out the most are a cheery, brown-eyed girl and a black haired, nerdy but friendly guy.

She tries to convince herself that it doesn't mean anything.

They both work at a coffee shop with her, and on break, they like to tell each other about what they would be doing if they weren't here.

The girl, Sandra, tells her that she would be singing. The boy, Andy, wants to be a stand-up comedian. They ask her where she would be, and she simply laughs, says that there's no where else she'd like to be but here, in the most exciting city in the world.

They both frown, ask her about where she was before here, then.

She laughs again, then with a serious tone, says "There is no before. There is now, and that's it."

.

Sandra and Andy do help her forget a little bit, they really do, but one day Jade realizes that they've done all they can, and they can't help her anymore.

And so, she goes home.

The first thing she does is call Beck. (She never bothered to change her number. Sometimes, he called her and she would listen to his messages on repeat all night long.)

He answers on the first ring, but still tries not to sound to excited, and tells her where is his new apartment is. She goes over there immediately.

However when he opens the door, there's no way his excitement can be contained. He picks her up and spins her around in circles. She starts getting a little bit annoyed, telling him to put her down, but not hitting his back like she used to do when he would pull something like this. He finally sets her back on the ground, and she faintly smiles, smoothing down her shirt. She notices how much better he looks than when she left him.

When she left, there were dark circles under his eyes, his facial hair was growing in, and he seemed to have a permanent frown etched on his face. Now though, his face is cleanly shaven, eyes gleaming, and his smile looks bigger than she thinks she's ever seen it.

"I missed you," he admits, taking her hand, looking in her eyes.

She bites her lip, meeting his eyes also, and says, "I missed you too, Beck. I really did."

He laughs then, loud and clear and real, and tells her, "You know, the old Jade would've beat me up for being a sap and spinning you around like that."

She snaps back into reality, and jerks her hand away, starting to back away from him.

"The old Jade died in that car wreck Beck, did you never realize that?" She starts to head toward the door, thinking she made a huge mistake, she should've just fucking stayed in New York where she was safe, where she was just starting to be happy, god she's such a fucking _idiot-_

"Hey. Jade wait," he grabs her arm and turns her around to face him again. "I never said I didn't like this new Jade. She looks better. Happier." He smiles again, and his puppy dog eyes almost make her melt, just like they did when they were both fourteen and different people (but somehow still the same).

"You look happier too," she finally admits, and he brings her into his arms, and it finally feels like home again.

.

As much as Jade would like to, she never really forgets about what happened. None of them do. But slowly, Jade and Beck start falling in love again, and Cat and Andre start falling in love for the first time.

They're happy again.

.

This is how it ends:

Four friends are driving home from a karaoke club on a strangely cold December night. Two sit in the front seat, two in the back, both pairs holding hands.

This is what they know:

Life can be good one second, and horrible the next. Everything can change in the blink of an eye, and the people sitting next to you right now might not be sitting next to you in a year. People will leave you, sometimes willingly, sometimes unwillingly.

Sometimes, for seemingly no reason, you will wake up in the middle of the night, shaking and crying and drenched in sweat; that's okay. You just turn yourself over, bury your head in your partner's shoulder, and tell them you love them. They will understand.

People can become so broken; that's okay. One day, when you wake up in the morning and the sun is shining and the birds are singing, you will begin to realize something:

We all heal. We heal each other. That's how life works.

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**a/n:** i kinda rushed this whole thing and i don't like it very much but i wanted to get it out regardless, so.. here you go. please review, constructive criticism is always appreciated.


End file.
